LITTLE BLUE BOOK NO. EZfl'J
Edited by £. Haldeman- Julius DOii

Antigone

Sophocles

Translated from the Greek by

Alexander Harvey

LITTLE BLUE BOOK NO.

Edited by E. Haldeman-Julius

562

Antigone

Sophocles

Translated from the Greek by

Alexander Harvey

HALDEMAN-JULIUS COMPANY
GIRARD, KANSAS

Copyright, 1924,
Haldeman-Julius Company

(This play must not be produced by professional
or amateur companies without written permission
from the Haldeman-Julius Company.)

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES' OF AMERICA

CHARACTERS

Chorus of Theban elders

Cbeon: Sovereign at Thebes

Haemon: Son to Creon, in love with Antigone

Teiresias: A blind seer

Guabd: In command at the burial ground

Messenger: A youth from the country

Antigone: Daughter of the late King Oedipus

Ismene: Sister to Antigone

Eurydice: Wife to Creon

Soldiers, maids in attendance upon Eurydice,

escort of Creon, citizens of Thebes
Scene: Before the palace of the Kings at

Thebes
Time: Shortly before the Trojan War

The division into acts and episodes follows
the precedents established by the great per-
formance of this play at the Second Theatre-
Francais (Paris) in 1844.

The Greek text employed in the translation is
that of Wolff.

ANTIGONE

ACT I.

' The portico of the palace of Creon at Thebes
is conspicuous in the back ground for the time
is the break of clay.

Well forward on the stage is seen the place
for sacrifice, known technically as the thymele.
It is in reality an altar-shaped platform in the
middle of the space left free for dancing and
similar exercises. On the thymele is built the
altar of Bacchus, now adorned wvth wreaths
and garlands.

The pillared portico of the palace in the
background is reached by a double flight of
steps at the sides. On the right of the portico
is the altar of Apollo. Three doors afford en-
trance into the palace — one for the women at
the right, one for the slaves at the left and
one in the middle for the king. A gate on the
extreme right of the garden affords access to
the open country while a gate at the extreme '
left gives on Thebes.

At the beginning of the tragedy Antigone is
discovered, a vase on her shoulder, beside the
altar to Apollo. She rests the vase lightly
upon the altar and, clasping her hands, looks
woefully upon the image of the god.

Antigone is in the flush of a vigorous and
beautiful young womanhood. Her robe clings
loosely to her figure in white folds, leaving
the arms bare. A purple cloak hangs from her
right shoulder. Her sandals are threaded with
gold.

After a moment of silent contemplation,

ANTIGONE 5

Antigone quits the scene by the gate on the
extreme right only to return in a moment
leading her sister by the hand. This sister,
Ismene, is a delicate, timid girl, somewhat
shrinking in manner and aspect. Ismene is
dressed in white, and is somewhat muffled
up as if she feared to be recognized.

Antigone. Oh, my very own sister, Ismene
dear, you surely know which of all the woes of
Oedipus has not come to pass, is not fulfilled
by Jove in the lives of the two of us! (The
sisters are the surviving children of Oedipus,
late King of Thebes.) Nothing painful or dis-
graceful or distressing or dishonoring that I
have not seen in your woes and my own! And
now what is this they also say throughout
the whole city about a proclamation just is-
sued by the commander of the troops? (Creon
thus referred to is not yet officially King.)
Have you heard anything of it? Or are the
evils coming to our friends from our foes un-
known to you yet?

Ismene. (Her timid accents contrast ivith
the bold tones of her sister.) To me no word
from friends, pleasant or painful, Antigone,
has come since we were deprived of our two
brothers dying on the same day each by the
other's hand. (The brothers thus referred to
were also children of the late Oedipus. One of
these brothers was Polynices and the other was
Eteocles. After Oedipus had left Thebes, Ete-
ocles and Polynices ruled by turns there. Dis-
putes arose between the brothers. Polynices
fled to the court of Adrastus who organized
for him the famous expedition of the seven
against Thebes. After much slaughter in the

6 ANTIGONE

attack upon the city, the brothers resolved to
decide the issue by single combat. Each slew
the other. The tragedy opens on the morning
after, the foe having fled in a rout.) Since
the forces of the Argives fled this very night
I know nothing more whether it be of happy
fortune or of grief.

Antigone. I knew it well and for that reason
I brought you outside the palace doors so that
you might hear alone.

Ismene, What is it? You are revealing some
deep plan.

Antigone, Has not Creon honored one of
our brothers with a tomb and held one in dis-
honor unburied? Eteocles indeed, as they say,
now treated with justice in obedience to the
law, was hidden under the ground, honored
with the dead below. But the dishonored dead
body of Polynices — they say this has been her-
aided to the citizens — is not to be hidden in ;
a tomb, not to be wept over. It is to be left
unmourned, unburied, a sweet prize for the I
birds in the shape of a free gift of food when
they see it. Such things they say the worthy
Creon has heralded to you and to me — espe-
cially to me, I say — and he is coming here to |
proclaim these things effectively to those who i
do not know them. He does not deem the
thing a trifling matter. Whoever offends in
these details has death by stoning in store for
him here in the city. Thus stand these things
— such is the state of affairs for you and soon
you will show whether you are trueborn o* I
are but the degenerate child of noble sires.

Ismene, And what, oh, wretched girl, if then* \

ANTIGONE 7

things are so, could I do more either to bind
or to loose?

Antigone. See whether you wiU aid with
labor or by running risks.

Ismene. What kind of risk? What is your
idea?

Antigone. Will you lift the body with this
hand? {Antigone touches Ismene' s hand. Some
versions suggest that Antigone raises her own
hand significantly.)

Ismene. Then you mean to bury him — a
thing forbidden in the city?

Antigone. He is my brother and yours too
even if you do not acknowledge it. (Some ver-
sions make Antigone say here: "I shall at any
rate bury my brother and yoursf if you don't
wish to") I will not be caught betraying him.

Ismene. Oh, reckless girl — for Creon has
spoken against it!

Antigone. But he has no power to prevent
me from serving my own.

Ismene. Woe upon me! Think, oh sister,
how our father died hated and disgraced when
on account of misdeeds exposed by himself he
tore out his two eyes with his own hand. Then
his mother and his wife, two names for the
same woman, ended her days disgracefully
with a noosed rope. Then our two brothers
by self slaughter on the same day, the unfor-
tunates, worked the same doom for each other
with deadly hands! And now we two left alone
seek how we shall die too most wretchedly if,
violating the law, we so defy the kingly might
and order. It behooves us to bear in mind that
we are women and that it is not for us to war
with men. Since we are governed by those

S ANTIGONE

more powerful than ourselves we must heed
these considerations, take these things into ac-
count and even things more humiliating. I
therefore implore those who have power below
to pardon me since I am under duress and
will yield to those in authority. To go beyond
this is to have no sense at all.

Antigone. Let me not command you. Even
if you were yet to wish to do this thing with
me you would not be satisfactory to me. Un-
derstand whatever seems good to you. I will
bury him myself. I would gladly die for doing
it. Dear to him, I will lie beside him who
was dear to me, doing holy things in sacri-
lege. I shall have more time to please those
below than those on earth for there I shall
be forever. If it seems well to you, dishonor
what the gods revere.

Ismene. I do no one dishonor. I was born
incapable of violence against the city's laws.

Antigone, Let that be your excuse. I will
go now to cover the grave of the brother so
dear to me.

Ismene. Wretched girl — how I tremble for
you !

Antigone. Fear not on my account. Look to
your own fate.

Ismene. At least confide this scheme to no-
body. Keep it to yourself and I will keep my
own counsel.

Antigone. Oh, proclaim it! You will be far
more hateful by your silence if you don't pub-
lish all this to everybody.

Ismene. You have a warm heart for a cold
task.

ANTIGONE 9

Antigone. I know that I am doing my duty
to those I ought to honor.

Ismene (as the dialogue attains its climax
she has gradually laid aside her original tim-
idity and is now talking in louder tones with
flashing eyes). You will do it if you can but
you talk of what you are helpless to do.

Antigone. When my strength gives out, I'll
stop.

Ismene. One should not undertake the im-
possible.

Antigone. (She, too, is now fully aroused.)
If you talk like that, I'll hate you and you
wMl be justly hateful to the dead. Let me and
my lack of wisdom suffer all this woe! I shall
endure nothing so dire as an unlovely death.

Ismene. If it seems good to you, go! Know
this, though you go foolishly, you are justly-
precious to those who love you. (Ismene may
mean: "You are really filled with love for
your dear ones" — that is, the dead brother she
means to bury.)

Antigone now lifts the vase she had depos-
ited on the altar of Apollo, places it on her!
head and quits the scene by way of the flight
vf steps on the right. Ismene returns within
the palace by way of the door for women.

Fifteen or sixteen elderly gentlemen, belong--
ing to the best families of Thebes, now make
their appearance. They comprise what might
be called the city council and are in special
session.. They group themselves in the avail-
able space left free at a little distance from
the palace.

They comprise the so-called "chorus"

As this tragedy is performed in our theatres,

10 ANTIGONE

in accordance with the religious grand opera
theory of a Greek play, eight of the old
enter first by emerging around the "thymele'
singing what is called a "strophe" and making
a tour of the altar of Bacchus. Next eight (or
seven) more of the aged gentlemen come upon
the scene to sing what is called the "anti-
strophe.'' The iv hole fifteen or sixteen, each
with a staff in his hand, then arrange them-
selves in a semi-circle and sing what is called
the "ode" while they dance.

All this is in accordance with an idea in
the mind of Doctor Dryasdust and the pedants
of his type. It is a perversion of the spirit of
the scene. What really happens is that the
old gentlemen come in not all at once and not
all saying the same thing and doing a song
and dance together, but each making a remark
and thus joining in the general discussion of
the previous night's tremendous battle and the
defeat of the foe. There is singing and there
may be dancing for that was the Greek
of expressing sentiment. In order to eo
an idea of what the elders really debated,
each sentence begins a new paragraph. It is a
discussion, not an ode. even if there was music
in the air at the time and in the Athens of Peri-
cles there was ahcays music in the air.

Chorus. A ray of the sun — the most beauti-
ful light of all that ever yet shone over seven-
gated Thebes! (One of the elders indicates it
with a gesture, for it is still but a little after
su n r i

You are shining at last, oh, eye of golden day,
appearing above Dirce's tides! (Dirce was the
great Theban river.)

ANTIGONE 11

The white-shielded fighter from Argos, com-
ing in his armor with all the weapons, has been
urged to swift rout in a wild rush away.

He was lured to our land by the wordy
quarrel of Polynices — (the speaker is inter-
rupted by another) — he flew over our land like
a shrieking eagle spreading a snow white pin-
ion (an allusion to the Argive shields) —

— with many weapons and with crests of
horses' plumes.

( There is a pause.)

He halted by our homes.

He arrived encircling our seven gated roads
with bloody spears.

He went before he filled his jaws with our
flesh and blood (or before our blood stained his
cheek) or Vulcan's torch could attain our lofty
towers.

Such was the din of Mars behind his back,
a dire thing to the foe of the dragon (the allu-
sion is a little obscure, but the dragon is evi-
dently in e ant).

(A pause.)

(We must infer that so77ie of the old gentle-
men sang a patriotic song and a few of them
may have danced to help pass away the ti7ne
until the meeting icas called to order. We 7nay
rest assured that, being Thebans. the old gen-
tle7nen did none of the preposterous and im-
possible things attributed to them by Doctor
Dryasdust.)

Jove loathes the boasts of a big mouth.

And seeing them coming on in a great tide,
over-armed in rattling metal, he struck with a
flash of flame him whom he saw rushing to
shout victory from our walls.

12 ANTIGONE

Upon the hard earth he descended with his
flashing bolt and then with maddened rush he
breathed out fiery flames with blows. (The
text is obscure here.)

Things took an unexpected turn.

Mighty Mars struck them one after another
with the force of a race horse.

Seven leaders of their spearsmen at seven
gates, equally matched, devoted to Jove their
brazen spoils of battle, save only the two hate-
ful ones who had one mother and one father
and yet matched against each other their sure
spears receiving the same death as the lot of
both. (The single combat of Polynices and
Eteocles is referred to. These two brothers
hated one another so much that, one legend
says, their flames refused to mingle ivhen the
two corpses were burned on the same funeral
pyre.)

But great and famous Victory has come to
rejoice with Thebes of the many cars.

Let us now be forgetful of battles and in
the temples of the gods let us all dance the
whole night together.

Let Bacchus, who dances everywhere in
Thebes, lead us.

(One of the elderly gentlemen announces a
new arrival on the scene.)

But here is the ruler of the country, Creon,
the son of Menoeceus — (he is interrupted by
another)

— he is the new sovereign by the recent turn
of affairs divine.

What plan is he meditating? For he called
this special meeting of the elders by public
proclamation.

ANTIGONE 13

Preceded by a guard of four warriors fully
armed, Creon enters. He is a man of about
fifty whose gray hair is conspicuous beneath
his plumed helmet. His limbs are encased to
the knees in armored boots and a breastplate
covers him from the waist to the neck. As he
stalks down from the central door of the pat-
ace, his troops emerge and pause tvhile he pro-
ceeds towards the elders grouped well in front
of the scene.

Creon. Gentlemen, the affairs of the city,
buffeted by many a sea of trouble, are again
righted by the gods. I have sent for you to
come here apart from everybody, knowing as
I do that you were loyal to the authority and
throne of Laius {King of Thebes before Oedi-
pus). Moreover, when Oedipus ruled the city
and later perished you stood by his children
with favoring counsels. Since they now by a
double doom perished on one day (the brothers
Polynices and Eteocles) each struck by the
other's fell hand. I hold here all power and
authority through nearest relationship with
the dead. There is no way of ascertaining the
character and capacity and mentality of any
man until he gains experience and shows it
in administration and in the law. To me it
seems that he who directing the whole admin-
istration of the city fails to seek the best ad-
vice but from timidity holds his tongue is the
worst of ancient or of modern men. And he
who prefers his friend above his country — I
hold him as nothing. (A slur on Antigone for
holding her brother dearer than the city au-
thority.) I, in truth, would never remain silent
if I beheld ruin stalking towards the city in

14 ANTIGONE

prejudice tc its safety — of this be Jove my wit-
ness, who sees all things. Nor would I hold a
person as a friend of mine who was hostile to
the land, knowing as I do that our country is
our salvation and that only while she goes
forward in safety do we make real friends.
(The idea of a ship of state is implied here
and Creon means that only when that ship
sails serenely are its passengers safe.) With
such counsels, do I promote the welfare of the
city. I have proclaimed accordingly to all the
citizens what I decided regarding the sons of
Oedipus. Eteocles — who died fighting for this
city, excelling all in the spear — is to be placed
within a tomb and to be blessed with all holy
things appropriate to the best of men who go
to the shades below. His brother — I mean Poly-
nices — who sought to destroy his native land
and his native gods by burning down their tow-
ers, who sought to ruin those of his own blood
and lead them off as slaves, I have proclaimed
to the whole body of citizens as one not to be
placed within any tomb nor to be even mourned.
Let him be unburied and may his body be a
shameful sight for birds to devour and dogs as
well. Those are my sentiments. Never with my
consent shall the evil be honored above the
good. He only who is a friend to this city shall
be honored by me in his life as in his death.

Chorus. (One of the Theoan elders speaking
for the rest.) Since such is your wish, Creon,
son of Menoeceus, regarding the enemy to this
town and regarding its champion, very well.
You have authority to do what you decide not
only affecting the dead but as regards us who
are still alive.

ANTIGONE 15

Creon. Look well to what has been decreed
by proclamation.

Chorus. Let this responsibility be borne by
the younger generation.

Creon. Sentinels are alert already beside the
dead body.

Chorus. What else have you to command?

Creon. Have nothing to do with those who
fail in obedience.

Chorus. There is no one so foolish as to seek
death.

Creon. That is, indeed, the penalty. Yet
many a time have men been destroyed by hopes
of gain.

The Guard enters with slow steps. He is a
rural type of the sort known in the United
States as a "village sport." Tie must not be
deemed stupid but he has the ancient Greek
duplex mind and in his vanity and his eagerness
to show how clever he can be, he becomes
something of a bore from overdoing his part.
He is a stalioart youth, belonging to the forces
of Creon but not enrolled in the army al-
though he bears a sword. His dark tunic comes
to the knees and a helmet surmounts his head
hut it is not crested, shoioing his humble rank
as a sort of toivn constable.

Guard. King, I will not say that I am come
so quickly as to be breathless or that I used
my feet lightly. I had many matters to re-
flect upon, making me turn around and around
in the road as if I might go back again. My
soul had many a thing to argue with me.
"Wretch, where are you going to get pun-
ished?"— "Oh fool! Stop where you are." —
"Yet if Creon learns of this from another

16 ANTIGONE

man, won't you suffer?" Meditating such
things, I toiled slowly on, feeling heavy and
thus a short path was made a long one. At
last I prevailed with myself to come here to
you. If I say not too much, yet I will at least
say something. I have come in the expectation
of one thing — I can have to endure only what
is fated for me. (The guard salutes with the
humility horn of a consciousness that he is a
very superior talker.)

Creon. What can it be that causes you such
uneasiness?

Guard. I should like to talk first to you
about myself. I did not do the thing. I did
not see who did it. I should not be justly in-
volved in difficulty for it all.

Creon. You build a fortification around
yourself with skill and you fence the affair
off well. You show that you have big news to
tell.

Guard. Bad news certainly plunges one into
hesitancy.

Creon. Won't you speak once for all and
then go away as a relief from this ordeal?

Guard. Yet I will tell it to you. Someone
has just buried the corpse and gone — having
heaped dry dust over the skin and bones and
done what else is meet.

Creon. {He is agitated.) What do you say?
What man has dared do such a thing?

Guard. I don't know. There was neither
blow of pick there nor clod from a spade. The
earth about was firm and unbroken and showed
no trace of wheels. It was a workman who
is trackless. When the first sentinel of the
morning showed it to us the wonder of all

ANTIGONE 17

was an unpleasant one, our amazement was
painful too. He (the dead) was gone out of
our sight, not entombed but thinly covered
with earth as if by one who would evade the
woe of leaving the dead unburied. No sign
either of beast or of dog was there and the
dead did not seem to have been lacerated.
Evil words passed from one to another of us,
sentinel challenging; sentinel. It might have
come to blows at last nor was anyone there to
prevent it. Each of us might have been the
doer of this thing and no one was found guilty.
All repudiated it, denied knowing anything of
it. We were ready to raise lumps of red hot
metal in our hands (a mode of taking oath to
a thing) and to go through fire, to vow to
the gods that we had neither done it nor knew
anything about the matter nor advised anyone
who did. Finally, when nothing was to be
searched out further, someone said something
that caused us all to bow our heads in fear
to the earth (a gesture of propitiation). We
had nothing to say against him and yet we did
not seem to be doing wisely if we acted on his
suggestion. (The original here is highly idio-
matic.) His advice was that this deed be re-
ported to you and must by no means be hid-
den from you. This prevailed. Upon me, poor
wretch, fell the lot of having to do this good
thing. (Or, winning the chance to seize the
advantage afforded by doing it.) I am here un-
willingly and unwelcome, that I know. No one
loves the messenger whose tidings are evil.

Chorus. Oh, king, to me it has seemed for
some moments of meditation as if this deed
might be inspired by the gods.

]8 ANTTGONE

Creon. Stop speaking before you fill me
with rage completely and are revealed as
senseless as well as senile. You utter what
is unendurable when you say that the gods
have had consideration for this dead body.
Did they glorify him as a benefactor when
they hid him by burial who arrived here to
set the temples aflame and their relics and
their land and break their laws? Do you ever
see the gods honoring the wicked? It is not
so! Such things are said against me for a
long time now by men who shake their heads
in secret and bowed not their heads duly to
the yoke of authority as those who love me
do. I know perfectly well that from their
number some have been led by lucre to do
this. Nothing ever flourished among men so
evil as money. This works havoc in the cities.
It drives men from home. It bends and turns
the honest mind of mortals to shameful things.
It shows men how to do evil and to know
every wicked work. All who were bribed into
conniving at this have simply done what will
effect their punishment at last. (He turns
from the elders of Thebes and talks to the
guard who has been prinking himself prepos-
terously and grinning at the confusion of the
old men.) Now as Jove is powerful and by
my reverence for his might, understand this
well, for I say it as a man under oath: if you
don't find the very hand that did this burying
and bring him into my sight, Hell itself will
not be punishment enough for you before you
are hanged up alive (he turns to the elders
as if to embrace them in one comprehensive
gesture of fury) to make this scandal public.

ANTIGONE 19

Thus may you know from what source gain
is to be had rightly and for the future learn
and understand that ye must not love profit
from everything and anything. You will find
that more men are cursed than are saved by
shameless filchings.

Creon pauses from sheer loss of breath in
the vehemence of his fury. The old men
coxcer in their corner. At last the Guard,
evidently daunted, summons up a little cour-
age. He has turned his back as if he meant
to be off.

Guard. Do you allow me to speak or being
thus turned, am I to go?

Creon. Don't you know even now that your
speech is offensive?

Guard. Does it bite your ears or your soul?

Creon. Why do you seek the source of my
sorrow?

Guard. The doer of this thing offends your
mind and I only your ears.

Creon. Ha! It is evident that you were
begotten to beguile. (Some versions have it:
you are a born babbler.)

Guard. Yet never the man to do this deed.

Creon. Yes — you'd even betray a soul for
silver.

Guard. Alas — it's hard that to him the
thing that seems should seem false!

Creon. Babble what seems to yourself. If
you fail to have before me the doers of these
deeds you will find that ill gotten gains work
ill. (He strides off with his escort).

The old men of the chorus of Thebans seem
to be excited by the going of Creon. They

20 ANTIGONE

make vain signals to indicate that he return.
At last they retire to their customary station
with many vehement gestures. The Guard,
recovering from his consternation , finds a
voice.

Guard. He'll certainly be found. (Vigorous
shakings of the head among the Thebans.) But
if he were caught or not, luck will decide that,
you won't see me coming back here. (Distress
among the Chorus.) Saved in spite of what I
looked for, beyond my expectation Indeed, I
owe the gods much gratitude. (He hurries
from the scene as if he were fearful of the old
men of the Chorus, who seem bent upon hold-
ing him back. They rush together in a group
and, stare up the road leading to the open coun-
try. Loud voices are heard and the marching
of feet)

ACT II.

The brightness of day now floods the palace
at Thebes. The scene is the same but some tivo
hours or m,ore have elapsed. The old men of
Thebes are discovered in a more composed
frame of mind. They are talking together se-
renely. Music is heard. What they say must
not be deemed an ilode" but a series of remarks,
a conversation, among }he members of the so-
called Chorus.

Chorus. Many things are terrible, but noth-
ing is more terrible than man.

He goes beyond the sea on the wintry wave
through the drenching tides.

Immortal and unwearied Earth, that loftiest
of divinities, he furrows year after year with

ANTIGONE 21

the plows turning with the equine breed of
young mules.

He leads captive the lightly swaying and
lightly singing breed of birds and the race of
wild beasts and the ocean brood out of the
teeming sea he takes with strings twisted into
nets — all-knowing man!

He holds in his snares the wild beast that
roams the mountains, he subdues the hairy
horse of uncombed neck with harness and he
yokes the mountain bull. (A correct transla-
tion is rendered difficult first by the state of
the text and n^xt by the theory tha~
to do with an ode instead of a d set to

music.)

And discourse of speech, and ethereal medi-
tation and the passion for local government by
law has he learned

— and to escape the dart of fierce frost in the
open air as well as the pelting rain.

All inventive!

He confronts the future never at a los-
garding the issue. (A highly idiomatic phrase
in the original and

Dryasdust. A word for word rendering might
be: Resourceless regarding nothing he comes
or goes to what things are to be.)

From death alone he shall plot no refuge.

Yet he has contrived to escape from hope-
less diseases.

Shrewd in contrivance, having arts beyond
fathoming, he glides to evil now or again to
good.

When he stands by the laws of the land and

22 ANTIGONE

of the gods and abides by the justice he has
sworn, high rises the city.

{Music and the humming of some at inter-
vals.)

No city is his who associates with what is
not worthy — such is the reward of his rashness.

Never may he be a guest at my hearth, never
let him deem himself my associate, who does
such deeds!

An agitated movement is heard off the scene,
accompanied by cries. The old men start up
from their discourse and stare in the direction
that leads to the open country. Some rural
characters enter hastily, folloiued by the Guard,
tcho has Antigone in custody. The old men
forming the Chorus burst into exclamations.

I see here a divine marvel!

How, seeing what I see, could I declare that
this maiden is not Antigone!

(She lifts up her head.)

Oh, wretched child of a wretched father —
Oedipus!

What is the matter?

Surely, it cannot be you!

You, led prisoner for breaking the sovereign's
laws!

And taken in disgrace!

Guard. Here she is who did this deed. We
caught her in the act of burial. But where is
Creon? (At that moment Creon emerges -from
the central door of the palace.)

Chorus. Here he comes forth just when he
is needed.

on. What is it? By what chance have
I come out just at the right time?

ANtlGONE 23.

Guard. King, mortals should not swear that
anything is impossible. A reconsideration falsi-
fies a sound judgment. I had sworn that it
would be a long time before I came back here
to face your threats by which I had been
daunted already. But the joy that comes despite
and beyond all expectation exceeds all other
delight in magnitude. I come, although in the
face of an oath sworn, leading this maiden
who was caught honoring the burial place,
adorning the tomb. No lots were cast to de-
cide this time — this is pure luck for me. And
now, oh King, take her yourself, if you wish,
in hand and question her searchingly. It is
but right that I go free of these difficulties.

Creon. You led her here — and in what way,
then, did you take her?

Guard. She buried the man herself. Now
you understand everything.

Creon. Do you understand and speak duly
what you are saying?

Guard. I saw this girl burying the corpse
you banned. Do I speak plainly and intelli-
gibly?

Creon. And how was she detected and was
she surrounded and seized?

Guard. The affair pased off like this. When
we arrived, those dire menaces of yours still
fresh, we scraped all the soil off the dead body,
completely baring it. We sat on the tops of
some mounds out of the breeze so that the
odor from the fellow might not strike us who
fled from it. Moving in lively fashion, man
stirring man with insulting words lest he shirk
this trouble, so much time elapsed that the

24 ANTIGONE

sun's flame was standing midway in the sky
and the fire of it burned us. Then all at once
a fierce wind raised a storm of dust, a pest in
the air, and the plain was filled, withering all
the leaves of the trees and even the open air
was suffocating with it. We covered and bore
the divine scourge. After a considerable time,
all was changed. The maiden was then seen.
She cried aloud the bitter notes of a bird's
shrill utterance when it sees the nest bereft of
a young brood. Thus was she when she saw
the bare body. (Pointing to Antigone, now
hanging her head.) She wailed with many a
cry and invoked dire curses upon those who
had done this work. With her hands she at
once carried dried soil. From a wrought brass
jug held high she sprinkled the corpse thrice
with libations. Seeing this, we rushed pellmell
and caught her at once, she not at all fright-
ened. We accused her of having done before
what she did then. She did not take her stand
upon any denial whatever. It was both a pleas-
ant and a painful thing to me, this. Nothing
is so agreeable as to get out of trouble oneself
tout it is painful to get one's friends into
trouble. But these things are all less impor-
tant to myself than is my own escape from
them.

Greon. And you — you, whose head is bowed
to the ground — speak — do you deny these
things?

Antigone (icithout raising her head). I
acknowledge having done it all and I deny
nothing.

on (to the Guard). You may take your-
self oft: to wherever you like — freed of a grave

ANTIGONE 25

charge. (To Antigone.) And you, speak not
roundabout but to the point — were you aware
of the proclamations forbidding these acts?

Antigone (In a low voice). I knew of them.
How was I to avoid it? It was made con-
spicuous.

Creon (mastering his rage with an effort).
Then you dared to violate the laws?

Antigone (she lifts her head and slowly rises
to her full height and faces Creon). It was not
Jove himself who proclaimed these edicts to
me nor did Justice, dwelling with the divinities
below, frame such laws for men. Nor did I
consider that your proclamations were of such
force and effect as to supersede the unwritten
and immovable edicts of the gods themselves,
since you are mortal. These live not for today
nor for yesterday but forever and no one knows
whence they derive. Not for violation of these
would I have to pay a penalty to the gods
through fear of any man's judgment. I knew
well that I must die. If I must die before my
time, that too I call gain. He who lives, as I
do, in the midst of many evils, will — how could
he otherwise? — -endure death as a blessing.
Hence to me there is nothing in the least pain-
ful in this doom. But if I had left one born
of my own mother to remain unburied in death,
then would I suffer anguish. I am not in sor-
rows through all this. (She makes a gesture
embracing the scene.) And if I seem to you
now to have been caught in imbecilities, I have
almost incurred the censure of an imbecile for
that imbecility. (She turns away from Creon
with a show of scorn and mockery.)

2$ ANTIGONE

Chorus. It is manifest that the impetuous
temperament of an impulsive father is that
of the daughter. She does not know how to
yield to adversities.

Creon. Yet understand plainly that stubborn
wills are most surely felled and the hardest
iron, tempered into durability by the heat, you
may see most frequently snapped and broken
short. By means of a tiny bit the hottest
horses, as I know, are dominated. It does not
behoove him who must serve his fellow mortal
to think too largely of himself. (He indicates
Antigone who has walked off towards the
palace steps and is regarding him with scernr
ful looks.) She was already accustomed1to be
haughty when she violated the plainest laws.
Her insolence, once accomplished, became two-
fold when she boasted of these things she had
done and laughed at them. I would be no man,
and she would be the man here if such power
is to be wielded by her with impunity. Though
she be my own sister's daughter or nearer by
kin than all who kneel at our domestic altar
of Jove (the family chapel or altar of Jove was
in the garden of a Greek home) she and those
of her blood shall not evade the worst of fates.
For I hold the other one (Ismene) no less
guilty in conspiring to effect this burial. (He
turns to the servants on the palace steps.) Call
her out! I saw her just now inside in hys-
terics, not in control of herself. The con-
science of those who are devising evil is apt to
be caught beforehand in the falsehood they de-
vise! Yet when anyone is taken in an act of
wickedness, I hate to see her try to glory in it!

ANTIGONE 27

Antigone (who stands scornfully regarding
him). Do you want to do more than kill me,
having caught me?

Creon. Not I, indeed. Having this, I have
everything. (He indicates her with equal
scorn. )

Antigone. What, then, do you intend to do?
Just as to me your words are pleasing in noth-
ing— and may they never please me! — so mine
must likewise be no less displeasing to you.
And from what source could glory be more
glorious than that derived from the placing of
a brother in the grave? All these people here
(indicating the old men of the Chorus) would
say they were pleased if fear did not tie their
tongues. But sovereign power rejoices in many
things besides the possibility of doing and say-
ing what seems best to it.

Creon. You alone of the Thebans see this.

Antigone. Even they see it (She indicates
the old men). On your account they hold their
tongues.

Creon. And you are not ashamed to think
you can do differently from them?

Antigone. There is nothing disgraceful in
honoring one's own flesh and blood.

Creon. Was not he a brother who died on
the other side?

Antigone. A brother by the same mother and
the same father.

Creon. How, then, being irreverent to him,
do you pay him honor?

Antigone. The dead body will not bear wit-
ness to such things. (She means that the dead
will not find fault.)

28 ANTIGONE

Creon. But if you place him on a level with
the godless?

Antigone. Not a slave, but a brother, died.

Creon. Ravaging this land! He stood forth
in its defense. (He means the other brother.)

Antigone. Nevertheless, Hades * demands
these laws be obeyed. (She means that the
gods below require the observance of the last
rites to the dead.)

Creon. But the good must not be treated on
a level with the bad.

Antigone. Who knows but this may seem
good down there?

Creon. An enemy, even when he dies, is no
friend.

Antigone. I was not born to share in hate
but in love.

Creon. Then going below, if you are to love,
love them down there. I will never be swayed
by a woman while I live.

The door leading into the women's portion
of the palace is thrown open and Ismene emerg-
es in a sioooning state. She is dishevelled,
her long hair flowing about her form. She is
supported by seve?*al female attendants. Her
appearance causes fresh agitation among the
old men of the chorus.

Chorus. There before the doors is Ismene!

She lets fall the tears of a loving sister!
(The text is involved in unnecessary dispute
owing to misconceptions of the real organiza-
tion of a chorus in a Greek tragedy.)

The cloud upon her brow is bloody — her face
is ashamed — her lovely cheek is wet!

Creon. (He is angered by the aspect of

ANTIGONE 29

Ismene.) You, too, crouching at home like a
spider stealthily sapping my strength — I did
not know I was feeding a pair of accursed con-
spirators against my throne. Here! Tell me —
do you admit being involved in this burial or
do you declare you know nothing about it?

Ismene. I did the deed, even if she shared
in it, and I was a participant and bear the
guilt.

Antigone. But fairness does not justify you
in this, since you did not want to do it and I
did not let you play a part in it.

Ismene. But in your trials I am not ashamed
to travel with you, having caused part of the
wroe myself. (Some versions make Ismene say
that she does not shrink from voyaging her-
self upon this tide of trials.)

Antigone. Whose the work was Hades and
those below record together. I love no friend
who is a friend in words.

Ismene. Do you despise me, sister, by not
letting me die with you and thus consecrating
the dead.

Antigone. You shall not die together with
me — and do not claim for yourself what you
had no hand in. I am enough to die.

Ismene. What life would be dear to me, de-
prived of you?

Antigone. Find favor with Creon — of that
you must be judge. (Or, as some translate,
look to Creon — you are his kin.)

Ismene. Why hurl these things at me — it
does not help.

Antigone. I am the sufferer — if I rejoice at
all it is on your account I rejoice.

30 ANTIGONE

Ismene. And how can I still help you in any
other way?

Antigone. Look out for yourself. I do not
envy you your escape.

Ismene. Oh, wretched girl — am I not in-
volved in your fate?

Antigone. You at any rate have life left — I
am to die, (or, you chose life and I death).

Ismene. But not because I left my words un-
spoken.

Antigone. To some you seem to speak well,
to others I appeared the one who understood
best.

Ismene. The guilt of this error is the same
for both of us.

Antigone. Have courage! You will live. My
soul has long been dead, since I had to serve
the dead.

Creon. I declare, one of these girls seemed
witless just now and the other has been so from
her birth.

Ismene. The mind, oh king, of those who
suffer evils, does not remain healthy as it was
when it was first in bloom but loses its poise.

Creon. So it was with you when you pre-
ferred to do evil with the evil.

Ismene. What life was worth while to me
when I was deprived of her?

Creon. Don't speak of her (indicating Anti-
gone). She is no longer in being.

Ismene. But are you not killing the bride of
your own son?

Creon. The furrows of other fields are
arable. (He can plow other fields).

Ismene. Not as she was attached to him.

ANTIGONE • 31

Creon. I hate vile women for my sons.

Antigone. Oh, dearest Haemon, how your
father dishonors you!

Creon. You are an affliction — you and your
love!

Ismene. And you will deprive your son of
her?

Creon. It is Hades that impedes this mar-
riage for me.

Chorus. It is decided, apparently, that this
girl must die.

Creon. Both for you and for me. (He
speaks to the escort). Wait no longer but take
her inside, take them within, menials! Hence-
forth, these women must not be running loose
in this style. Even the bravest take flight
when they see Hades yawning for their lives.
(The attendants and the escort go off, escort-
ing Antigone and Ismene).

Chorus. Happy are they whose lot is not
spiced with evil.

Those whose home has been shaken by the
gods lack no curse creeping upon generation
after generation, in fulfillment. {A rather
free version. The reader way regard these
words as forming an ''ode" if he likes but
they are in reality the philosophical reflections
of a lot of old gentlemen discussing the latest
sensation in Thebes.)

When a tide forced by raging winds on the
deep dashes through the gloom in the bosom
of the sea, how the waves lift their lofty
crests and the black sand rolls upward from
below while the beaten shores resound with
the buffeting winds! (A very discreet re-

32 ANTIGONE

mark of general tenor in view of the fact that
Creon is there to hear it.)

The ancient woes of the family of Labdacus
(the Theban dynastic line) are piled high
upon the griefs of the dying, I see.

One generation does not free the next for
some god is always smiting them and there is
no release for any.

Now, indeed, the last roots of the family
tree of Oedipus are deprived of the light of
life and are become as dust with the gods
below — (speaker interrupted, apparently , by
the next).

Such is senselessness in speech and fury of
mind!

Who among men can withstand the power
you wield, oh Jove?

Sleep, that leads us all in due time to old
age, impotent sleep, has no power over you,
oh Jove, and time can not touch you. (The
text is in dispute here).

You are the sovereign to whom Time can
not allot an old age and you are forever in
the flashing brilliance of Olympus. (As some
gossip, others pray).

What has been and what will be is ordained.

No bliss enters into the earthly lot of men
without its curse as well.

Many-thrilled hope is a benefit to many
men.

To many it is a false promise of light loves.

No man is experienced until he has thrust
his foot into the hot fire.

Speech is made glorious by wisdom.

Yet there are times when the evil seems
good — if some god be luring us into disaster.

ANTIGONE S3

There is very little time without its woe.

Here comes Haemon, the last born of your
sons. (As this is said, the Theban elders ad-
dress Creon more directly).

He comes in distress on account of the
doom of his future bride, Antigone, he is
overwhelmed with anguish because of his
blighted marriage.

Haemon, now a vigorous youth approaching
the age of twenty-eight, rushes upon the scene
breathless. He is quite tall and his attire and
his weapons denote a soldier. His aspect is
that of a man worn out by loss of sleep. He
gives a hurried look around and seems eager
to speak but must pause for breath.

Creon. Soon we shall know more than the
seers. Oh, my son, have you not heard the
fixed sentence of your intended bride since
you come here raving against your father? Or
am I still dear to you whatever I do?

Haemon. Father, I am yours. You having
good principles, direct the ways in which I am
to follow. No marriage shall be deemed by me
preferable to being well guided by you.

Creon. Thus, indeed, my son, would you
have your heart, esteeming everything sub-
ordinate to your father's judgment. On this
account men pray that they may have good
children growing up at home, so that they
may be defended from the evils intended for
them by foes and that the father's friend may
be honored as the father is. He who begets
useless offspring — what else shaU be said of
him than that he has made woes for himself
and delight for his foes? So, my son, do not
for the sake of a woman's pleasure discredit

34 ANTIGONtf

your mind, knowing that such an embrace
grows cold when a wicked woman is your
mate at home. What plague is worse than an
evil friend? Cast her from you as if she were
loathsome to wed with someone in Hades. For
since I caught her openly standing alone in
defiance out of the entire town I will not prove
myself false to the city, but will kill her. On
this account let her invoke again and again
a goddess akin to herself. If I will bring my
family up as a source of disedification, then
I must do precisely the same with strangers.

Creon pauses as if he would hear what the
others have to say. There is silence and he
resumes.

He who is a worthy man at home seems just
to the whole city. He who goes to excess or
who does violence to the laws or who thinks
of over-awing the rulers is not going to gain
my praise. But he whom the city appoints,
him must we hear and heed in little things
and $reat, in just cases and in unjust. Such
a man I would venture to call competent to
rule and to be worthy when subjected to au-
thority too. Were he stood in the line of
spearmen he would stand firm and straight and
true. There is no worse evil than anarchy.
That is the ruin of cities. It sets homes in
rebellion. It breaks the allied line of spears.
Obedience, submission to authority, saves the
most bodies among the well drilled. (This is an
obscure illustration because it is borrowed from
the military tactics of the ancient battle field.)
Thus must we become a bulwark to the well
disposed and not be found inferior to any
woman. It is better, if we must, to fall by

ANTIGONE ZB

the blow of a man and not be rated as inferior
to women.

Chours. To us, indeed, if we be not led
astray by our own age, you seem to be saying
sanely the things you have apparently pond-
ered. (That is, what you say, you say well,
you seem to know what you are talking about.)

Haemon. Father, the gods put minds into
men, of all possessions the supreme one. I,
however you may not wisely say these things,
would not be able to controvert them with
other words, although some other man might
be able to do it well. I was born to look out
for a-U that concerns you whatever anyone
may say or do or censure. Your look is a
dread thing to the man of the people and he
reveals it in words that you would not like to
hear. My part has been to listen to these
things — some said privately — and I know what
grief on this girl's account fills the city. They
say she is the worthiest of women and that it
is most wicked for her to have to die because
she did what was glorious. She it was who
when her own brother fell slaughtered un-
buried would not leave him to the mongrel
curs to be devoured nor to birds of prey. Is
she not worthy of the golden medal of honor?
Such is the gossip that goes about in secret.
To me, father, your well being is a boon.
There is no possession more precious. What
can be a brighter diadem for the children than
a flourishing father or what for a father is
more precious than his sons? Do not, then,
have one manner for yourself alone, as if you
were saying that you and nobody, else could

36 ANTIGONE

be right. He who deems that he alone can
think sanely and that in tongue or in soul he
and nobody else has an advantage, he is seen
when bared to be empty, when exposed to be
nothing. For a man, even if he be a wise one,
is not disgraced by having to learn many
things and to yield much. You see how in the
wintry streams many a tree gives way so
that it may save its branches while those which
withstand the force are utterly destroyed. Thus
he too who keeps the mast of his vessel un-
yieldingly up, causes it to turn upside down
and voyages under the seats for the rowers
at last. So yield your anger and give way. If
I who am younger may venture an opinion,
I would declare that it were best for a man
to be born wise than to have to acquire wisdom
by experience. The balance does not always
incline that way but still tt is well to learn
something from those who speak with wisdom.
(The speech is somewhat obscure because Hae-
mon is trying to convince the old men in the
chorus as well as his father without at the
same time offending Creon.)

Chorus. Oh, king, it would become you, if it
be timely to say it, to learn from what he says.
You, too, (to Haemon) might learn from him.
Both sides have spoken well.

Creon. (To the Chorus) Are those of my
age to be taught to think by a man of his age
and experience?

Haemon. In what is unjust — by no means!
If I am young, you should consider not my
years but my capacity.

ANTIGONE 37

Creon. Is it our business to regard the rep-
robate?

Haemon. I would never bid anyone honor
the evil.

Creon. Is she not smitten with this pest?

Haemon. The whole people of Thebes say
no.

Creon. Is the whole city to order me and
is it incumbent upon me to heed its orders?

Haemon. Do you not realize that what you
say is spoken by a mere youth? It is he now
(indicating his father to the chorus) who talks
like a lad.

Creon. Am I to rule this land otherwise
than on my own responsibility?

Haemon. But that is no city which is under
the sway of one man.

Creon. Is not a city rated according to the
ruler of it?

Haemon. You would be fortunate as the
sole ruler of a desert isle.

Creon. (To the Chorus). He's figliting, it
seems, with the woman.

Haemon. If you are that woman! I am anx-
ious on your account.

Creon. Oh, vilest of men, going to do battle
against your father!

Haemon. Do I not see you transgressing the
laws of right?

Creon. Do I transgress when observing my
own laws?

Haemon. You do not observe them when
you disregard what is due to the gods.

Creon. Oh, base spirit, lower than a
woman's!

bS ANTIGONE

Haemon. You will never catch me yielding
to the base.

Creon. Yet your whole speech is for her
sake.

Haemon. And for your sake and my own
and for the sake of the gods below.

Creon. You'll never marry her while she
lives!

Haemon. Then she must die and in dying
destroy someone — else!

Creon. You go to an extreme of boldness in
thus threatening.

Haemon. What threat is there in talking
against empty judgments?

Creon. You'll regret your own judgments,
for it is yours that are empty.

Haemon. If you were not my own father, I
would say you were not in your right mind.

Creon. Being a woman's slave, don't trifle
with me!

Haemon. You want to talk and yet listen to
no speech in reply?

Creon. Really? But, no, by Olympus! you'll
pay up for these taunts. (To the escort) Lead
in that wretch so that in his sight she may
die in the presence of the bridegroom!

Haemon. Not beside me — never think it!
— shall she perish nor shall you ever again see
my face. Rant henceforth among the friends
who can put up with you! (He rushes out by
the road leading to the open country.)

Chorus. Oh, king, the man has gone upon
the impulse of his anger. A young mind when
upset is dire in its impulses.

Creon. Let him do or plan more than man

ANTIGONE 39

can do. He shall not change the doom of those
two girls.

Chorus. Do you intend to put them both
to death?

Creon. Not the one who did not touch the
body — you speak in season.

' Chorus. And by what death will you slay
her?

Creon. Leading her where mortal footstep
has not yet trod, I will hide her yet alive in a
rocky grotto with so much food as the rites
of propitiation make fitting so that there need
be no curse upon the city. And there, implor-
ing Hades, the only god she reveres, {Hades
was a deity as well as a place and the dead
were the great concern of Hades) perhaps she
will escape death, it will happen that she shall
not die, perhaps, or else she will know how-
ever tardily that it is a waste of effort to
revere Hades.

Creon, accompanied by his escort, marches
gloomily up the palace steps and retires within
the main portal, paying no^ attention to the
frenzied gestures of the old men of the chorus,
who have some words to offer. There seems
to be some agitation within the palace and the
old men, exchanging looks, express the greatest
agitation. Music is heard.

ACT III

Before the palace of Creon at Thebes, groups
of people have gathered, evidently in expectar
Hon of something to happen.

It is early afternoon of the same day.

The old gentlemen of Thebes who form the

40 ANTIGONE

local council and who are always referred to
in the text as Chorus, are grouped in their ac-
customed place, Now and then a group of
the gathering people will pause to listen to the
deliberations or the prayers or other proceed-
ings of these Theban elders. Nevertheless, gen-
eral interest centers in the palace itself, which
has no sign of life beyond the pacing to and
fro on the steps of some armed sentinels.

Chorus. Love is never worsted in battle.
Love overwhelms all possessions and he spends
his nights on the soft cheeks of virgins.

Thou {the speaker is addressing Love as a
deity) thou dost wander over the wide sea
and into the abodes of the rustics too.

Not even one among the immortals finds
refuge from thee to say nothing of mere men.

He raves who has thee {in his heart).

Thou canst deflect the just mind itself into
prejudice to its destruction.

Thou hast worked up this family quarrel.

Triumph is in the bright longing of the eyes
of the bride finely arrayed.

The power of the mighty is in the sanctity of
old laws.

The goddess of Love wins without battles.

{The gathering crowd grows more agitated
as signs of activity multiply about the palace
portals.)

{One of the Theban elders announces an
event.)

Even I am excited beyond the limits of the
law — seeing what I see.

{The palace portal appropriated to the no.v.cn
is thrown open and Antigone, bound, is led

ANTIGONE 41

forth by the attendants. The surging crowd
is held back by the sentinels.)

1 can not stop the flowing of my tears as I
behold Antigone thus attended to the bridal
bed of death that awaits us all.

(Before descending the palace steps in cus-
tody. Antigone looks around her at the crowd.
Her remarks are not necessarily addressed ex-
clusively to the Theban elders although the
things she says are for their benefit too.)

Antigone. Citizens of my native land, look
upon r.ie ts I go my last way, seeing my last
of the light of the sun! Hades, the attendant
of us all, leads me yet living to the banks of
Acheron (a river in the pagan hetT) not fated
to be wed, for I shall not be celebrated in any
marriage hymn, being already doomed to
espousals below. I shall wed with Acheron.

Chorus. Then gloriously and with song you
depart for the hidden places of the dead.

Neither by wasting illness are you stricken
nor have you received the lot of the sword,
but of your own free decision, living free and
solitary, you will go down unique among mor-
tals to your place in hell. (The Hades or hell
of the ancients teas no such place of fire and
trim stone as some modern theologians have
described for the edification of Christians.)

Antigone. I have heard that the Phrygian
stranger perished miserably on the summits
of Sipylus, she, the child of Tantalus. (Niobe
is referred to. isted of her many chil-

dren, thus vexing the mother of Apollo and
Diayia. who had borne but those two. Niobe
found her children all slain by Apollo and

42 ANTIGONE

Diana and she wept herself into a stone or into
a fountain under a stone on Mount Sipylus.)
She was subdued like the pendent ivy over
the budding stone. Now she wastes away into
rain, according to the legends of men, and the
snows never leave her while her bosona is wet
with the tears falling from her grieving eyes.
My destiny, most like hers, sings me to her
sleep.

Chorus. But she was a goddess and goddess-
born and we are mortals of an earthly breed.
Yet is it high renown to have it said of a
dying woman that she was on a level with
the divine while she lived and even when she
died.

Antigone. Oh — they make sport of me!
(This remark is not necessarily a reply to the
last words from the Chorus out is Antigone's
comment upon the deportment of some of the
crowd.) Gods of our fathers, why do you in-
sult me thus before I am gone and out of sight,
oh, my city, and ye men of money in my city!
Oh, ye fountains of Dirce {source of Theoan
waters) and soil of many-charioted Thebes you
wil,l attest how I am stricken down unwept of
friends and by what edicts I depart for the
stony grotto in my new-cut tomb. Miserable
girl that I am! Neither among men nor with
the dead below have I any home — neither with
the living nor with the dead shall I be!

Chorus. Rushing to the extreme of boldness,
before the lofty throne of Justice herself, you
have fallen far indeed, my child.

You are paying a penalty for a father's fault.

Antigone. You have freshened a sore wound,

ANTIGONE 43

my pity for my father and my grief for all the
woes in the doom upon the glorious family of
Labdacus. Oh, my mother's marriages! (Jo-
casta, mother of Antigone, married a monarch
who teas slain unwittingly by his oicn son,
whereupon that son — Oedipus — married his
own mother — Jocasta — all the parties being
unaware of their family relationship.) Curses
were upon her slumber — ill-fated mother! — by
the side of her son, my father! From what
doomed beings I took my birth! With them
thus cursed I go now unwed to dwell. (A
pause.) Oh, my unfortunate brother, wofully
wed, you have destroyed me living with your
dying! (She means Polynices, xcho made a
marriage that led to his expedition against
Thebes.)

Chorus. To respect is to be respected. (They
mean that if she had respected the law she
would not be in this ignominy.)

Authority, wherever authority itself is in-
volved, will tolerate no usurpation.

Your own deliberate wilfulness ruined you.

(Antigone has by this time been borne down
the steps of the palace towards the gate lead-
ing into the open country. The discussion
among the elders has been turned into a de-
bate which is having a marked effect in keep-
ing the crowd passive. Creon makes a quick
entrance with his escort through the main door
of the palace and stands looking down upon
the scene from his station at the top of the
flight of steps.)

Antigone. Unmourned, friendless and un-
sung in bridal bloom, I am led along this way

44 ANTIGONE

prepared for me. No more will it be allowed
me to see the hol,y eye of the flashing sun. My
doom is a tearless one — no friend bewails me.

Creon. Rest assured that songs and wails
before death would not cease for a moment
were it any good to sound them. {He ad-
dresses the custodians of Antigone ivhose prog-
ress is now impeded by the throng.) Won't
you get her away as quickly as possible? And
when you have her well roofed into the tomb
as I ordered you, leave her alone in it to de-
. cide whether she is to die or whether she is to
go on living under the roof of such a grave.
{He addresses the crowd.) As regards this
girl, our hands are clean. She wiU be de-
prived of the companionship of those above
ground.

Antigone. Oh, tomb, oh bridal bower, oh,
everlasting cell within the bosom of the
guarded rock, to you I go to join my own peo-
ple, the great number of them among the dead
as guests of Persephone {Queen in Hades) !
The last of these am I and the worst by far
to go down, perished by a dire doom before
my time. Yet do I hold the hope that my com-
ing will be welcome to my father and a delight
to you, dear mother, and precious to yourself,
oh dear brother mine! When you were dead,
I, with this hand of mine adorned you for
the tomb and poured out your libations. Now,
oh Polynices, I pay this penalty for having
honored your dead body!

(Now comes a portion of Antigone's famous
speech on her way to the tomb which has pro-
voked one of the most vehement and most

ANTIGONE IS

voluminous controversies in the history of
classical literature. Let the paragraph be read
attentively first and comment will come next.)
Even though I did you honor, to the well
disposed this will seem proper. Had I been
the mother of children or had a husband of
mine been stretched out dead, never would I
have assumed this task in defiance of the city's
law. With reference to what law do I speak?
(Antigone is conscious of being carefully
heeded as she speaks.) Had my husband been
dead, it would have been different. There
might have been a child by another, had I lost
the one. With father and mother both below
in Hades, there could be no brother to be born
for me ever again. In deference to that law,
I placed you first, dear brother, and to Creon
I seemed to sin and to dare wrongly. And
now a prisoner in their hands, am I led seized
helpless, unwed, receiving no share of the joy
of marriage nor of the rearing of children
but thus without friends, ill-fated, I wend my
way alive to the tombs of the dead!

(Some of the most eminent men in literature,
including Goethe, have declared that this pass-
age must be spurious. Sophocles could not have
written it, they say, because it is inconsistent
with the motive professed all along by Anti-
gone. She has been hitherto glorified as a
conscientious objector. Now toe have her say-
ing that had she been a wife and mother,
things might have been different. Yet she said
not so long before that she honored her
brother's dead body because no human edict
could supersede the code of heaven. Yet we

46. ANTIGONE

must remember two things that explain what-
ever Antigone says here that seems at first
blush inconsistent. She is appealing for synv-
pathy to the people, well knowing that she has
that sympathy but hoping that there may yet
be a popular intervention in her favor. In the
next place she is in love with Haemon, and the
desolation of having to go to the tomb without
even becoming his bride for an hour may ex-
cuse the weakness of her womanly mood. The
dispute over this famous passage arises from
that misconception of the function of the
Chorus in Greek tragedy to which attention has
been called already. Antigone is not pleading
with the Chorus. She is pleading with the
people of Thebes, addressing the crowd.)

What code of justice emanating from the
gods have I violated? Why must I, the un-
fortunate, look to the gods any more? For
what champions am I to call? Am I not called
irreverent for my display of reverence? But
if these men are the sinners, may they suffer
no more woes than they have unjustly done to
me. (The agitation of the spectators grows
so great that the elders of Thebes in session —
the "Chorus" — say a word to quiet the crowd.)

Chorus. Still the same furies dominate her
in storms of soulr

Creon. Those who lead her captive shall yet
grieve for their tardiness. (Her guards urge
her.)

Antigone. Oh! That speech goes nearest to
a sentence of death. (The meaning is obscure
unless Antigone is exclaiming to the crowd

ANTIGONE 4 7

that Creon has sealed her doom with his harsh
words to her gaolers.)

Chorus. I can not encourage you with the
idea that you are not to endure such a fate.
(Some editors think Creon says this.)

Antigone (feeling herself urged along fur-
ther.) Oh, Theban fatherland and gods who
begot our race! They lead me off and I am
not to live! Behold me, ye rulers of Thebes!
(Antigone makes desperate gestures to the
elders.) The last left of your line of leaders
— see what I suffer and at the hands of what
men! I who worshipped what was worshipful!
(She is dragged off through the gate.)

Chorus. Danae herself dared to exchange
the light of heaven for brazen halls. (Danae
was the daughter of a king who feared she
might have a child who would slay him. He
locked her up in a chamber where she was vis-
ited by Jove in the form of a shower of golden
rain.)

Hidden in that tomb chamber, she was a
prisoner.

Nevertheless, by birth she was renowned, oh
my daughter and honored with the golden seed
of Jove, flowing about her.

Dire is the night of doom and destiny!

Neither wealth nor war nor the strong tower
nor the wave-beating black ships afford flight
from it.

The son of Dryas, swift to anger, he, the
king of the Edonians, was in bondage for his
wrathful mockeries, for at the bidding of Bac-
chus he was immured in a stony cell. (This
was Lycurgus — not the great Spartan law

48 ANTTOONE

maker — who opposed the worship of Bacchus
or Dionysos and was blinded by the power of
Love and subjected to various ordeals.)

Thus the dire frenzy was nipped in the bud.

In his frenzies he knew the god he affected
with his mocking tongue.

He interfered with the inspired women and
the divine fire and he enraged the flute-loving
Muses.

Beside the dark blue clashing rocks in the
tide of the twin seas are the shores of the
Bosphorus and Salmydessus where the Thra-
cians come. There Mars beheld the accursed
wound which the wild wife of Phineus in-
flicted upon his two sons — the doom of dark-
ness on those eyes that raved in their en-
circling glance ere she with gory fingers and
her knitting needles tore them from their
sockets. {Cleopatra — not to be confused with
the famous queen of Egypt — was the wife of
Phineus, king of Salmydessus. He became in-
fatuated with another woman who put Cleo-
patra into a rocky prison and gouged out the
eyes of the sons of Phineus by Cleopatra.)
Other versions render these lines: Mars liv-
ing near the town beheld a cursed blow — a
blinding wound inflicted on the pair of the
sons of Phineus by a relentless spouse — ex-
tinguishing their eyes that called for revenge
by smiting the youths with bloody hands and
the edge of the shuttles. (The text is un-
certain.)

Wasting away, they lamented their woes,
having a mother unwed, a birth unhonored by
a marriage (their mother being repudiated).

ANTIGONE 49

Yet she, in her line of descent, attained the
time-honored stem of the Erechtheidae. ( The
mother of this luckless woman icas a daughter
of Erechtheus, glorious from the foundation of
Athens.)

In caverns afar she was reared among her
father's tempests, a child of Boreas, the north
wind, swift as a steed over the high hill, child
of the gods in her erectness, stepping high.

Yet upon her, my child, the inevitable fates
were hard.

The members of the Chorus, thus apostro-
phizing Antigone as she is borne off down the
highway, have their minds diverted by the
entrance of Teiresias. a famous blind seer. The
blind man is led by a boy. At sight of the blind
man, Creon is visibly disconcerted.

Teiresias, Theban lords, I come by the com-
mon road — two seeing with one pair of eyes.
For the blind man his path must be made
clear by means of a guide.

Teiresias sighs from weariness and leans
heavily upon his staff as with one hand he puts
the heavy locks of hair away from his cheek.

Creon. Old man Teiresias, what's new?

Teiresias, I will tell you and do you heed
the seer.

Creon. I have never yet disregarded your
judgment.

Teiresias. Thus did you guide the ship of
3tate safely.

Creon, I know and can attest your services.

Teiresias. And rest assured that now again
you stand on the edge of fortune's abyss (or
the fine edge of doom.)

50 ANTIGONE

Creon. What's this? How I tremble at your
words!

Teiresias. You'll learn when you hear the
portents of my science. Sitting on my ancient
seat of divination where every bird to me is
a seeker of its haven I heard an unfamiliar
note of feathered songsters, a crying in dread-
ful* anguish and in clamorous chorus, unin-
telligible, barbarous. They were tearing one
another in dire slaughter with their claws, I
knew. The rush of wings was not meaning-
less to me. Fearful, I at once prepared a sac-
rifice on an altar all aflame. Prom the sac-
rifice, Vulcan shone with no flame {an evil
omen, for the fire was low). A dew exhaled
from the thighs and ran upon the ashes and
gave forth clouds of vapor while the gall was
scattered to the winds and the flesh of the
thighs bared the encasing fat. Thus from this
boy I found out the vainness of the auguries I
sought, for he is a guide to me as I am to
others. And the city is sick with these things
through your sway. Our altars and all our
sanctities in home and earth are cursed
through the hounds and the birds that have
sated themselves on the luckless corpse of the
son of Oedipus. For this reason the divinities
will not henceforth favor our entreaty and our
offering or the fire of fleshly sacrifice. No
bird emits an intelligible cry fed as all birds
now are on the fatness of a dead man's
slaughter. Consider these things, my sdn. To
all men it is customary and common to fall
into error. When he is in error, he is neither
a foolish man nor an impoverished one when

ANTIGONE 61

he retrieves the evil into which he has fallen
and shows himself amenable to argument. Ob-
stinacy renders one liable to the imputation of
dark ignorance. Now yield to the dead. Deal
no blow to the defeated. What glory is there
in any slaying of the dead? Wishing you well,
I speak well. It is most agreeable to learn
from him who is well spoken if he speaks to
your advantage.

Creon. Oh, aged seer, all aim their shafts at
this man (strikes his breast) as if they were
archers trying at targets and to you I must
also seem no man unversed in divination see-
ing that I have long been sold to seers and
shipped off like goods in their trade. Profit!
Make money! Drive bargains in the white gold
of Sardis (gold alloyed icith silver) and in In-
dian gold if you like. In the tomb, for alj that,
you shall not hide that fellow. Not even if the
eagles of Jove were to snatch him up to the
very throne of the deity will I, for fear of any
such pollution by carrion, permit his burial. I
know perfectly well that no man can bring
pollution upon the gods. They fall — oh aged
Teiresias, they among mortals who shape dis-
graceful suggestions with beautiful language
for the sake of profit to themselves, fall with
the direst of descents!

Teiresias. Did any man ever know or hear
tell—?

Creon. What? What hackneyed thing are
you saying?

Teiresias. How much the greatest of all
possessions is wisdom!

52 ANTIGONE

Creon. Just as lack of foresight, it seems to
me, is the worst of evils.

Teiresias. That is the very affliction with
which you ase cursed.

Creon. I do not deem it becoming to retort
upon a seer uncivilly.

Teiresias. And yet you speak just so when
you say I prophesy falsely.

Creon. Well, the breed of prophets was ever
fond of money.

Teiresias. And the breed of kings loves a
mean advantage.

Creon. You know you are speaking to your
sovereign.

Teiresias. I know. Through me you hold
this town securely.

Creon. You are a wise seer yet you love in-
justice.

Teiresias. You provoke me to speak from
the depths of my soul, to reveal all!

Creon. Go on — only don't speak for the sake
of your own gain.

Teiresias. I shall be considering your own
advantage.

Creon. You shall not trade on my credulity.
(Or, my understanding is not to be trafficked
in.)

Teiresias. Now understand this well — not
many more courses of the sun's chariot of day
will you follow before you will see the child of
your loins given in exchange, dead for dead,
to death. You have despatched those above
down below and set a soul dishonored in its
living tomb while retaining here above one
whose lot is with the divinities of the shades,

ANTIGONE 53

being a dead body, unburied, unsepulchred, un-
honored. These doings are not for you nor
for the gods above and yet you dare do violence
yourself to them, for which the instruments
of full revenge lurk in hell, the Furies (the
Erinyes, a sisterhood who slept in Hades until
some ivickedness aroused them to come up to
earth and pursue the evil doer) so that you
may be caught in the working of your wick-
edness and damned for it. Such a^e the things
I am impelled to tell you for what you call
the love of gain. In no long time the lamenta-
tions of men and women will rouse your house.
The city is torn by all manner of hatreds in
those whose mutilated sons were polluted by
dogs and wild beasts or by the winged bird
bearing its unholy odor to the hearthstone of
the slain. Such are the shafts which like a
bowman I aimed at your heart, bearing their
venom surely to their aim and from the sting
of which you shall write. You, boy, lead me
to my home again and let this man smite the
young with his wrath and learn also to train
his tongue into silence and to bear in his
bosom a heart more swayed by reason than
now he keeps there. (Teiresias is led out
quickly oy the hoy.)

Chorus. That man, oh king, has gone prophe-
sying dreadful things. Ever since I had locks
of hair to shake around (my cheek) and turn
white instead of black I know he has not fore-
told what was false to our city.

Creon. I know that also and my mind is un-
easy. It is not well to give in. To hold out

54 ATCTIGONEJ

and crush my soul with a curse is awful like-
wise.

Chorus. Oh, son of Menoeceus, you should
take good advice!

Creon. Then what should I do? Speak! I
will be advised.

Chorus. Go and bring the maiden up from
the stony roof and build a tomb for the one
lying exposed and prone.

Creon. That is your view — and I must yield?

Chorus. As quickly as possible, oh king!
Quick retribution from the divinities hastens
to catch up with the evil of those who plan
mischief. (Or, swift vengeance from the gods
overtakes the evil in design.)

Creon. Ah! I relent in my resolve to do this
deed. Grim necessity is not to be resisted.
(Or, we must not war with necessity.)

Chorus. Go now and do it — let it not be left
to others.

Creon. I shall go just as I am. (He turns
to his suite.) Go, comrades, every one, those
here and those there (inside) with spears in
your hands rush to the place which is in plain
sight from here. I will myself, since my mind
has been thus turned, seeing that I shut her
up, I will be on hand to free her. I am much
afraid it is best to obey the established laws
than to live in mere safety to the end of one's
life. (Creon means that the laws established
by the gods — ivhich required the burial of the
dead — ought to be obeyed even if one thus
failed to round but one's life in peace and
safety.)

Creon, attended by Iiis escort, rushes off.

AXTIGOXK 55

The old gentlemen of Thebes, the senators,
that is to say, in council, are now served with
liquid refreshments. As each old man takes
his cup of wine he makes some appropriate ob-
servation on the subject of Dionysos or Bac-
chus, god of the grape juice. Doctor Dryas-
dust, that is, the pedantic scholar, tells us that
the members of the Chorus are really singing
an ode or "worshipping" but this is a view of
the subject that rests upon a religious and
operatic conception of Greek tragedy, a theory
that does no harm if ice do not accept it as es-
tablishcd historical fact.

Chorus. Oh, many named! Delight of the
Theban bride {that is, drink served at wed-
dings) and offspring of loud roaring Jove, you
who invest bright Italy {the vine grew every-
where there) and mingle in the Eleusinian
throngs, welcome! {Drinks.)

Oh, Bacchus, dwelling in your mother city
Thebes, and by Ismene's waters (a famous
stream) on ground in which the dread dragon's
teeth burst into bloom! {Drinks.)

Above the pair of hills whereon the fires of
the torch-bearers go, Bacchus has been seen
amid the nymphs of Corycia, Bacchantes them-
selves along the banks of the Castalian springs.
(Drinks.)

From the Nysan slopes (mount in Euboea)
you come to us, from where the ivy creeps and
from the lands where many grapes cluster as
they are hymned in words that shall be
heavenly while you scan the Theban furrows.
(Drinks.)

This is the town honored by thee above all

56, ANTIGONE

others for the sake of your thunder-smitten
mother. (An allusion to the mother of Bac-
chus, who bore him amid the lightnings to
Jove, she being a Theban maid.)

And now, when all the city languishes in the
clutches of a dread disease, come with benign
feet over the slopes of Parnassus and across
the resounding waters. (They drink.)

Oh, breathing fire as you lead the dance of
the stars, listening for the nightly songs, (Or1,
Oh, leader of the fire-breathing stars and mas-
ter of the voices of the night, you child of
Jove, appear! (This allusion to the revels of
the Bacchantes under the moon is followed by
a dance in tvhich all do not join.)

Come, oh sovereign, with your attendant Bac-
chantes, they who dance wildly all the night,
give honor to those who cry aloud the name
of Iacchus! (The allusion to the Bacchic cry
is rounded out with a dance and drinks.)

The revels of the old gentlemen are inter-
rupted by the hurried arrival of a messenger.
He is obviously a country-bred youth, yet cul-
tured and refined in aspect and clad in bright
scarlet tunic over which he has a white fold-
ing cloak. His feet are sandalled. He carries
his helmet in his hand.

Messenger. Citizens of Thebes, and dwellers
in the house of Amphion (he built a wall
around Thebes) there is no stage of a man's
life that ever I would deem praiseworthy or
censurable. Luck it is that sets him up and
luck throws down not only the fortunate but
the unfortunate as well. There is no foretell-
ing what in the life of men is fixed and de-

ANTIGONE 57

termined. Creon was enviable, or so it seemed
to me once for he had saved this Theban land
from its foes and he had received the sole
sovereignty and well he swayed it, flourishing
as the well born father of a princely line. Now
all is in ruin. When their delights betray men
I no longer think of them as living but rather
as a corpse that goes on breathing. Let there
be riches in your home, great riches, if you
like, and live on as the ruler of the scheme
of things below. Yet if there be no cause of
delight in it all, I would not esteem that state
more than the shadow of a vapor so far as
yielding satisfaction goes.

Chorus. And what news of the woes of our
princess have you come here to tell us?

Messenger. They die. The living are guilty
of their death.

Chorus. Who were the slayers? Who were
victims? Tell us.

Messenger. Haemon is dead. He was slain
by his own hand.

Chorus (incredulous, they ask for confirma-
tion.) Do you mean by his own hand or by
his father's?

Messenger. He slew himself, enraged against
his father for a murder.

Chorus. Oh, seer! how well you prophesied!

Messenger. The thing passed off like this —
for you must consider the rest. (His words are
broken off by agitation ivithin the palace.)

Chorus. But I behold the unfortunate Eu-
rydice, wife of Creon, and she comes out of the
palace door either because she has heard of her
son's fate or for some cause.

58 ANTIGONE

The doors of the women's wing of the palace
have by this time opened and three maids
appear in the folds of their brown cloaks and
with arms bared. Next appears Eurydice, a
beautiful middle-aged woman with hair turning
gray. She wears a bright yellow robe, reach-
ing to her feet, and gold-threaded sandals. Her
head is bare. She carries a vessel from which
pours a cloud of incense. A young girl carries
a lighted taper at the side of Eurydice. Euryd-
ice herself advances to the edge of the steps
leading down to the garden level.

Eurydice. Citizens all, I overheard words
as I was walking to the outer door to get to the
altar of Pallas and there offer her my prayers.
Just as I was lifting the bars of the unbolted
gate, my ears were assailed by the voice of
homely grief. I was overcome with anxiety and
I fell back into the arms of my maids for I
was sore stricken by the sounds. But what-
ever the words were, tell them to me at once.
I can listen, not being without my knowledge
of sorrow and evils.

Messenger. I, dear madam, for I was an eye
witness, will leave no word of all the truth
untold. Why should I extenuate anything
when in the end all that is falsified will be-
come plain? Let the truth only be told always.
I was walking with your husband as his guide
across the lofty plain where lay the remains
of Polynices, mutilated by the dogs, with none
to take compassion. And we pacified Pluto and
the sepulchral, hands of the triple goddess we
rendered propitious with our entreaties.
(Hecate haunted cross roads and was supposed

ANTIGONE 5

to make trouble for those who ignored her
presence.) We performed the sacred ablutions
of the corpse, bathing what was left of it with
lustral waters and with the branches we tore
from the trees by the side of the road we made
a pyre funereal. Next we reared a mound of
the native soil. At last we sought the stony
bridal bed of the maid, entering that hollowed
nuptial chamber of the bride of Hades. All. at
once someone from afar heard a shriek issuing
from the weird tomb and signalled the fact to
his master Creon, who was approaching. A dire
presentiment at the sound of that cry over-
whelmed him as he drew nearer and nearer
and with a wail of woe he spoke his anguish.
"Wretch that I am!" he cried. "Am I a seer in-
deed? Do I now travel the direst of all the
ways I ever went. The voice of my son reaches
me. Go! my grooms, hurry up and when you
are beside the tomb force your way through
the entrance, assure yourselves whether it is
the voice of my son Haemon issuing through
the gap in the stones or whether I am deluded
by the gods/' Moved by his entreaties and the
cries of his grief, we went and searched.

Eurydice listens transfixed and her maidens
support her on all sides as the Messenger pro-
ceeds with his narrative.

In the last corner of the tomb we came to we
saw her hanging by the neck, pendent from a
hempen cord finely woven. He with his arms
around her waist was bewailing the marriage
that was frustrated by the deed of a father and
mourning his own wretched passion. When he
{Creon) saw him (Haemon) he groaned and

60 ANTIGONE

rushed forward and called aloud in anguish
once again. "What are you doing here, my
son? Oh, wretched youth, what deed is yours?
What is your plan? Are you mad in your grief?
Come out, my son, I implore you." But with
wild looks in his eyes the youth glared and
spat in the face of his father and saying noth-
ing, drew forth his two-edged sword. His father
rushed in panic and the weapon missed its
mark. Then the miserable youth in fury against
himself, fell upon his sword and drove it half
through his ribs. Then, while yet he breathed
and had his senses, he strained the maiden to
his heart. Even while he breathed his last, he
tinged her white cheek with the dripping of
his own blood stream. He lies now a corpse
beside a corpse and he has received his bridal
bliss in the abodes of Hades. He has shown
men that lack of judgment is the greatest evil
that befalls a mortal,. (In complete silence,
Eurydice is borne within by her attendants.)

Chorus. What does that suggest to you?
The lady has turned back before she has spoken
a word, good or bad.

Messenger. I am overwhelmed myself. I
comfort myself with hopes that she will not
deem it proper to afford her grief for her son
an echo in the city but within her own home
and beneath her own roof she will bewail her
sorrow with her maidens alone. She is not
without experience to such an extent as to go
wrong.

Chorus. I don't know. To me this unnatural
silence seems suggestive no less than would
loud lament in vain.

ANTIGONE 61

Messenger. Well, I will go inside lest she
keep within the secrecy of her soul some pur-
pose that is hidden. You advise well. An ex-
treme silence is ominous. (He enters the pal-
ace by the servant's door.)

There is a sudden disturbance along the road
that leads forth into the country. A motley
procession is seen and the body of Haemon is
borne in on a stretcher.

Chorus. And here comes the king himself
(Creon is seen winding up the procession)
bringing a gloomy trophy with his own hands,
if one may be permitted to say so, not the curse
hurled by another but the dread deed of him-
self. '

Creon. Ah! (He drops on his knees beside
the corpse.) The woes of men are born of
madness — sins that ever lead to doom and
death. You see before you the one who slew
and the one who perished — both of a breed.
Oh, for my own vain counsels! Oh, my son!
In youth you went the way of destiny to de-
struction. You have perished not through
your own folly but by mine.

Chorus. You seem to see the right when it
is too late.

Creon. Oh, I have dreadful things to learn.
Some god put it into my head to do what I
did. Some deity struck me mad and lured m«
into ways of woe and wickedness. My joy is
trampled under foot — oh! The vain toils and
troubles of men!

The Messenger emerges from the palace.

Messenger. Oh, sir, you have your hands
full already with the woes you bring here and

6.2 ANTIGONE

yet soon within this palace will you come to
behold evils no less terrible.

Creon. And what evil is to be worse than
the evil we know now?

Messenger. Your wife is dead too, the
mother of this dead boy, unfortunate one that
she is! She died from blows she dealt herself
just now.

Creon. Oh, too accessible port of Hades,
why do you yawn for me? Oh, you bringer of
evil tidings, what a message is yours! Ah!
I was a man done to death already and yet
see what you have done besides! What do
you say, oh son? Have you no new message
for me? Alas! Slaughter is heaped upon
doom and the death of a wife is added to the
woes I have.

Chorus. The spectacle is here for you to be-
hold. It is no Longer hidden.

The doors of the palace are opened and the
tody of Eurydice is seen on a bier covered
with flowers, while her maidens stand about
and weep. Music within.

Creon. Ha! Now I see a second grief,
wretched man! What curse, what doom will
yet be heaped upon me? I have just embraced
my son and here I have another dead body to
look at. Oh, unhappy mother and unhappy
son!

Messenger. It was upon the altar there
within that, in her grief and desolation, with
one blow, she pierced her heart, stabbing her-
self by means of a keen blade and then shut
her eyes so dark in death. A ljttle while be-
fore she wept for the hapless taking off of

' ANTIGONE 63

Megareus (a Theban warrior who died heroi-
cally at one of the city's famous seven gates)
and next her tears flowed for that other son
(Megareus and Haemon were brothers) whom
we see here and last of all she breathed her
imprecations upon you, the slayer of the chil-
dren.

Creon. Ah! I am filled with horror. Who
will slay me with his double-edged sword? I
am under a doom and overwhelmed by its dire-
ness.

Messenger. More than once in her agony
she whose dead body lies there scored you as
the slayer of this son and that other one.

Creon. In what way did she do violence to
herself?

Messenger. She struck herself to the vitals
with her own hand the moment she heard of
the terrible torment of her son.

Creon. Upon no other mortal can this train
of cause and consequence be fastened. I, I,
did the murder, man of woe am I! Let me
confess it. Ye servants, lead me away as
quickly as you can, lead me away for I am as
good as done for.

Chorus. You advise to advantage — if there
be any advantage in evils. The woes before
our feet are worst when they are swiftest.

Creon. Let it come — let it come — it appears
as a boon amid my woes, that last day I have
to live will be my best! Let it come — let it
come — that never may I behold another morn-
ing!

Chorus. Those are things to come. What

C4 ANTIGONE

lies at hand must now be done. Take care of
what you must take care of.

Creon. But I am praying for what I love
most of all.

Chorus. Pray for nothing now. The thing
that is inevitable — to this woe there is -no alter-
native for mortals.

Creon. Take the helpless man away! I, oh
my son, slew you, but not by design, and her,
too — oh, what a wretch am I! I have nothing
to look to more nor a place in which to find
rest. All is evil that my hands have wrought
and there {he points to the dead) upon my
head a doom is heaped that is not to be borne.
{He is led within.)

Chorus. First in well-bein£ monies good
judgment. The things that pertain to the gods
must not be polluted ever. Mighty words
bring mighty woes upon those who boast and
teach the experienced what to think. (Or, in-
struct the aged in wisdom.)